Water environment not checked effectively
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-08-27 09:07
A senior Chinese lawmaker said on Saturday China still faces a severe water
environment situation as the trend of deterioration of water environment "hasn't
been checked effectively".
"Total discharge of waste water reached 52.4
billion tons in 2005, a rise of 26 percent over 2000," Sheng Huaren,
Vice-Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, in
his report to a meeting of the NPC Standing Committee on inspection of
compliance with environmental protection law.
He said water pollution
treatment tasks in major drainage areas during the Tenth Five-Year Plan period
(2001-2005) are not fully fulfilled. In the Haihe River, Liaohe River and Huaihe
River valleys, only 70 percent of the tasks are fulfilled.
He said water
at nearly one third of monitoring points across the country remains seriously
polluted and has lost ecological functions.
In the Yellow River Valley,
water at one fourth of monitoring points is seriously polluted.
Sheng
said the Weihe River, a major tributary of the Yellow River, annually receives
more than 600 million tons of waste water and 270,000 tons of chemical oxygen
demand, which is nearly about four times of its environmental
capacity.
He said many enterprises discharge waste water without
treatment. To reduce production cost, some new enterprises also do not treat
waste water properly.
He said 278 of 661 Chinese cities have no sewage
treatment plants. Some existing sewage treatment plants do not operate in full
capacity for the lack of supporting pipe networks. Some existing sewage
treatment plants with complete pipe networks suspend operation from time to time
due to the lack of reasonable charge collection policies and lack of operating
funds.
He said such issues have been raised several times in the past
inspections, but haven't been effectively resolved yet by now.
"We hope
those sewage treatment plants, built with huge funds, can really live up to
their functions," said Sheng.
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